英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

abroad [abroad 词源字典]: abroad: [13] It was only in the 15th century that abroad came to mean ‘in foreign parts’. Earlier, it had been used for ‘out of doors’, a sense still current today, if with a rather archaic air; but originally it meant ‘widely’ or ‘about’ (as in ‘noise something abroad’). It was formed quite simply from a ‘on’ and the adjective broad, although it was probably modelled on the much earlier (Old English) phrase on brede, in which brede was a noun, meaning ‘breadth’.
=> broad[abroad etymology, abroad origin, 英语词源]
accent: accent: [14] Accent was originally a loantranslation from Greek into Latin (a loantranslation is when each constituent of a compound in one language is translated into its equivalent in another, and then reassembled into a new compound). Greek prosōidíā (whence English prosody) was formed from pros ‘to’ and ōidé ‘song’ (whence English ode); these elements were translated into Latin ad ‘to’ and cantus ‘song’ (whence English chant, cant, cantata, canticle), giving accentus.

The notion underlying this combination of ‘to’ and ‘song’ was of a song added to speech – that is, the intonation of spoken language. The sense of a particular mode of pronunciation did not arise in English until the 16th century.
=> cant, cantata, canticle, chant
account: account: [14] Account is of Old French origin. It was formed from compter, conter ‘count’ (which derived from Latin computāre) and the prefix a-. Its original meaning in English, too, was ‘count’ or ‘count up’; this had disappeared by the end of the 18th century, but its specialized reference to the keeping of financial records is of equal antiquity. Account for, meaning ‘explain’, arose in the mid 18th century.
=> count
ache: ache: [OE] Of the noun ache and the verb ache, the verb came first. In Old English it was acan. From it was formed the noun, æce or ece. For many centuries, the distinction between the two was preserved in their pronunciation: in the verb, the ch was pronounced as it is now, with a /k/ sound, but the noun was pronounced similarly to the letter H, with a /ch/ sound.

It was not until the early 19th century that the noun came regularly to be pronounced the same way as the verb. It is not clear what the ultimate origins of ache are, but related forms do exist in other Germanic languages (Low German āken, for instance, and Middle Dutch akel), and it has been conjectured that there may be some connection with the Old High German exclamation (of pain) ah.
acid: acid: [17] The original notion contained in the word acid is ‘pointedness’. In common with a wide range of other English words (for example acute, acne, edge, oxygen) it can be traced back ultimately to the Indo-European base *ak-, which meant ‘be pointed or sharp’. Among the Latin derivatives of this base was the adjective ācer ‘sharp’.

From this was formed the verb acere ‘be sharp or sour’, and from this verb in turn the adjective acidus ‘sour’. The scientist Francis Bacon seems to have been the first to introduce it into English, in the early 17th century (though whether directly from Latin or from French acide is not clear). Its use as a noun, in the strict technical sense of a class of substances that react with alkalis or bases, developed during the 18th century.
=> acacia, acne, acrid, acute, alacrity, ear, edge, oxygen
acolyte: acolyte: [14] Acolyte comes, via Old French and/or medieval Latin, from Greek akólouthos ‘following’. This was formed from the prefix a- (which is related to homos ‘same’) and the noun keleuthos ‘path’, and it appears again in English in anacolouthon [18] (literally ‘not following’), a technical term for lack of grammatical sequence. The original use of acolyte in English was as a minor church functionary, and it did not acquire its more general meaning of ‘follower’ until the 19th century.
=> anacolouthon
acquire: acquire: [15] The original source of acquire, Latin acquīrere, meant literally ‘get something extra’. It was formed from the verb quaerere ‘try to get or obtain’ (from which English gets query, the derivatives enquire and require, and, via the past participial stem, quest and question) plus the prefix ad-, conveying the idea of being additional. English borrowed the word via Old French acquerre, and it was originally spelled acquere, but around 1600 the spelling was changed to acquire, supposedly to bring it more into conformity with its Latin source.
=> query, quest, question
acrostic: acrostic: [16] An acrostic is a piece of verse in which the first letters of each line when put together spell out a word. The term is of Greek origin (akrostikhis), and was formed from ákros ‘at the extremity’ (see ACROBAT) and stíkhos ‘line of verse’. The second element crops up in several other prosodic terms, such as distich and hemistich, and comes from the Greek verb steíkhein ‘go’, which is related ultimately to English stair, stile, and stirrup.
=> acrobat, distich, hemistich, stair, stile, stirrup
acrylic: acrylic: [19] Acrylic was based ultimately on acrolein [19], the name of a very pungent poisonous organic compound. This in turn was formed from Latin acer ‘sharp, pungent’ (source of English acrid) and olere ‘smell’.
actual: actual: [14] In common with act, action, etc, actual comes ultimately from Latin āctus, the past participle of the verb agere ‘do, perform’. In late Latin an adjective āctuālis was formed from the noun āctus, and this passed into Old French as actuel. English borrowed it in this form, and it was not until the 15th century that the spelling actual, based on the original Latin model, became general. At first its meaning was simply, and literally, ‘relating to acts, active’; the current sense, ‘genuine’, developed in the mid 16th century.
=> act, action
adamant: adamant: [14] In Greek, adamas meant ‘unbreakable, invincible’. It was formed from the verb daman ‘subdue, break down’ (which came from the same source as English tame) plus the negative prefix a-. It developed a noun usage as a ‘hard substance’, specifically ‘diamond’ or ‘very hard metal’, and this passed into Latin as adamāns, or, in its stem form, adamant-. Hence Old French adamaunt, and eventually English adamant.
=> diamond, tame
addict: addict: [16] Originally, addict was an adjective in English, meaning ‘addicted’. It was borrowed from Latin addictus, the past participle of addicere, which meant ‘give over or award to someone’. This in turn was formed from the prefix ad- ‘to’ and the verb dicere. The standard meaning of dicere was ‘say’ (as in English diction, dictionary, and dictate), but it also had the sense ‘adjudge’ or ‘allot’, and that was its force in addicere.
=> dictate, diction, dictionary
adhere: adhere: [16] Adhere was borrowed, either directly or via French adhérer, from Latin adhaerēre. This in turn was formed from the prefix ad- ‘to’ and the verb haerēre ‘stick’. The past participial stem of haerēre was haes- (the ultimate source of English hesitate), and from adhaes- were formed the Latin originals of adhesion and adhesive.
=> hesitate
adjacent: adjacent: [15] Adjacent and adjective come from the same source, the Latin verb jacere ‘throw’. The intransitive form of this, jacēre, literally ‘be thrown down’, was used for ‘lie’. With the addition of the prefix ad-, here in the sense ‘near to’, was created adjacēre, ‘lie near’. Its present participial stem, adjacent-, passed, perhaps via French, into English.

The ordinary Latin transitive verb jacere, meanwhile, was transformed into adjicere by the addition of the prefix ad-; it meant literally ‘throw to’, and hence ‘add’ or ‘attribute’, and from its past participial stem, adject-, was formed the adjective adjectīvus. This was used in the phrase nomen adjectīvus ‘attributive noun’, which was a direct translation of Greek ónoma épithetos.

And when it first appeared in English (in the 14th century, via Old French adjectif) it was in noun adjective, which remained the technical term for ‘adjective’ into the 19th century. Adjective was not used as a noun in its own right until the early 16th century.
=> adjective, easy, reject
adjutant: adjutant: [17] An adjutant was formerly simply an ‘assistant’, but the more specific military sense of an officer who acts as an aide to a more senior officer has now virtually ousted this original meaning. The word comes from a Latin verb for ‘help’, and is in fact related to English aid. Latin adjuvāre ‘help’ developed a new form, adjūtāre, denoting repeated action, and the present participial stem of this, adjutant- ‘helping’, was borrowed into English.
=> aid, coadjutor
affable: affable: [16] The Latin original of affable, affābilis, meant ‘easy to speak to’. It was formed from the verb āffārī ‘speak to’, which in turn was derived from the prefix ad- ‘to’ and fārī ‘speak’ (the source of fable, fame, and fate). It reached English via Old French affable.
=> fable, fame, fate
affect: affect: There are two distinct verbs affect in English: ‘simulate insincerely’ [15] and ‘have an effect on’ [17]; but both come ultimately from the same source, Latin afficere. Of compound origin, from the prefix ad- ‘to’ and facere ‘do’, this had a wide range of meanings. One set, in reflexive use, was ‘apply oneself to something’, and a new verb, affectāre, was formed from its past participle affectus, meaning ‘aspire or pretend to have’.

Either directly or via French affecter, this was borrowed into English, and is now most commonly encountered in the past participle adjective affected and the derived noun affectation. Another meaning of afficere was ‘influence’, and this first entered English in the 13th century by way of its derived noun affectiō, meaning ‘a particular, usually unfavourable disposition’ – hence affection.

The verb itself was a much later borrowing, again either through French or directly from the Latin past participle affectus.
=> fact
affinity: affinity: [14] The abstract notion of ‘relationship’ in affinity was originally a more concrete conception of a border. The word comes, via Old French afinite, from the Latin adjective affinis, which meant literally ‘bordering on something’. It was formed from the prefix ad- ‘to’ and the noun finis ‘border’ (from which English also gets finish, confine, and define).
=> confine, define, finish, paraffin, refine
affront: affront: [14] The present-day notion of ‘insulting someone’ has replaced the more direct action of hitting them in the face. Affront comes, via Old French afronter, from Vulgar Latin *affrontāre ‘strike in the face’, which was formed from the Latin phrase ad frontem, literally ‘to the face’.
=> front
again: again: [OE] The underlying etymological sense of again is ‘in a direct line with, facing’, hence ‘opposite’ and ‘in the opposite direction, back’ (its original meaning in Old English). It comes from a probable Germanic *gagin ‘straight’, which was the source of many compounds formed with on or in in various Germanic languages, such as Old Saxon angegin and Old Norse íg gegn.

The Old English form was ongēan, which would have produced ayen in modern English; however, Norse-influenced forms with a hard g had spread over the whole country from northern areas by the 16th century. The meaning ‘once more, anew’ did not develop until the late 14th century. From Old English times until the late 16th century a prefix-less form gain was used in forming compounds.

It carried a range of meanings, from ‘against’ to ‘in return’, but today survives only in gainsay. The notion of ‘opposition’ is carried through in against, which was formed in the 12th century from again and what was originally the genitive suffix -es, as in always and nowadays. The parasitic -t first appeared in the 14th century.
ago: ago: [14] Historically, ago is the past participle of a verb. Its earlier, Middle English, form – agone – reveals its origins more clearly. It comes from the Old English verb āgān ‘pass away’, which was formed from gān ‘go’ and the prefix ā- ‘away, out’. At first it was used before expressions of time (‘For it was ago five year that he was last there’, Guy of Warwick 1314), but this was soon superseded by the now current postnominal use.
=> go
aid: aid: [15] Aid comes ultimately from the same source as adjutant (which originally meant simply ‘assistant’). Latin juvāre became, with the addition of the prefix ad- ‘to’, adjuvāre ‘give help to’; from its past participle adjutus was formed a new verb, adjūtāre, denoting repeated action, and this passed into Old French as aïdier, the source of English aid.
=> adjutant, jocund
alien: alien: [14] The essential notion contained in alien is of ‘otherness’. Its ultimate source is Latin alius ‘other’ (which is related to English else). From this was formed a Latin adjective aliēnus ‘belonging to another person or place’, which passed into English via Old French alien. In Middle English an alternative version alient arose (in the same way as ancient, pageant, and tyrant came from earlier ancien, pagin, and tyran), but this died out during the 17th century.

The verb alienate ‘estrange’ or ‘transfer to another’s ownership’ entered the language in the mid 16th century, eventually replacing an earlier verb alien (source of alienable and inalienable).
=> alibi, else
alike: alike: [OE] Alike is an ancient word whose ultimate Germanic source, *galīkam, meant something like ‘associated form’ (*līkam ‘form, body’ produced German leiche ‘corpse’ and Old English lic, from which we get lychgate, the churchyard gate through which a funeral procession passes; and the collective prefix *gameant literally ‘with’ or ‘together’).

In Old English, *galīkam had become gelīc, which developed into Middle English ilik; and from the 14th century onwards the prefix i-, which was becoming progressively rarer in English, was assimilated to the more familiar a-. The verb like is indirectly related to alike, and the adjective, adverb, preposition, and conjunction like was formed directly from it, with the elimination of the prefix.
=> each, like
aloud: aloud: [14] Aloud was formed in Middle English from the adjective loud and the prefix a-, as in abroad; it does not appear to have had a direct Old English antecedent *on loud. Its opposite, alow ‘quietly’, did not survive the 15th century.
=> loud
alter: alter: [14] Alter comes from the Latin word for ‘other (of two)’, alter. In late Latin a verb was derived from this, alterāre, which English acquired via French altérer. Latin alter (which also gave French autre and English alternate [16], alternative [17], altercation [14], and altruism, not to mention alter ego) was formed from the root *al- (source of Latin alius – from which English gets alien, alias, and alibi – Greek allos ‘other’, and English else) and the comparative suffix *-tero-, which occurs also in English other.

Hence the underlying meaning of Latin alter (and, incidentally, of English other) is ‘more other’, with the implication of alternation between the two.
=> alias, alien, alternative, altruism, else
ambidextrous: ambidextrous: [16] Ambidextrous means literally ‘right-handed on both sides’. It was formed in Latin from the prefix ambi- ‘both’ and the adjective dexter ‘right-handed’ (source of English dextrous). Ambi- corresponds to the Latin adjective ambo ‘both’, which derived ultimately from the Indo-European base *amb- ‘around’ (an element in the source of ambassador and embassy).

The second element in Latin ambo seems to correspond to Old English ba ‘both’, which is related to modern English both. Other English words formed with the prefix amb(i)- include ambient [16] (which came, like ambition, from Latin ambīre ‘go round’), ambit [16] (from Latin ambitus ‘circuit’), ambiguous, ambition, amble, and ambulance.
=> dextrous
ambiguous: ambiguous: [16] Ambiguous carries the etymological notion of ‘wandering around uncertainly’. It comes ultimately from the Latin compound verb ambigere, which was formed from the prefix ambi- (as in AMBIDEXTROUS) and the verb agere ‘drive, lead’ (a prodigious source of English words, including act and agent). From the verb was derived the adjective ambiguus, which was borrowed directly into English. The first to use it seems to have been Sir Thomas More: ‘if it were now doubtful and ambiguous whether the church of Christ were in the right rule of doctrine or not’ A dialogue concerning heresies 1528.
=> act, agent
ambush: ambush: [14] Originally, ambush meant literally ‘put in a bush’ – or more precisely ‘hide in a wood, from where one can make a surprise attack’. The hypothetical Vulgar Latin verb *imboscāre was formed from the prefix in- and the noun *boscus ‘bush, thicket’ (a word of Germanic origin, related to English bush). In Old French this became embuschier, and when English acquired it its prefix gradually became transformed into am-.

In the 16th century, various related forms were borrowed into English – Spanish produced ambuscado, Italian was responsible for imboscata, and French embuscade was anglicized was ambuscade – but none now survives other than as an archaism.
=> bush
analysis: analysis: [16] The underlying etymological notion contained in analysis is of ‘undoing’ or ‘loosening’, so that the component parts are separated and revealed. The word comes ultimately from Greek análusis, a derivative of the compound verb analúein ‘undo’, which was formed from the prefix ana- ‘up, back’ and the verb lúein ‘loosen, free’ (related to English less, loose, lose, and loss).

It entered English via medieval Latin, and in the 17th century was anglicized to analyse: ‘The Analyse I gave of the contents of this Verse’, Daniel Rogers, Naaman the Syrian 1642. This did not last long, but it may have provided the impetus for the introduction of the verb analyse, which first appeared around 1600; its later development was supported by French analyser.
=> dialysis, less, loose, lose, loss
anecdote: anecdote: [17] In Greek, anékdotos meant ‘unpublished’. It was formed from the negative prefix an- and ékdotos, which in turn came from the verb didónai ‘give’ (a distant cousin of English donation and date) plus the prefix ek- ‘out’ – hence ‘give out, publish’. The use of the plural anékdota by the 6th-century Byzantine historian Procopius as the title of his unpublished memoirs of the life of the Emperor Justinian, which revealed juicy details of court life, played a major part in the subsequent use of Latin anecdota for ‘revelations of secrets’, the sense which anecdote had when it first came into English.

The meaning ‘brief amusing story’ did not develop until the mid 18th century.
=> date, donation
annex: annex: [14] The verb annex entered English about a century and a half before the noun. It came from French annexer, which was formed from the past participial stem of Latin annectere ‘tie together’ (a verb annect, borrowed directly from this, was in learned use in English from the 16th to the 18th centuries). Annectere itself was based on the verb nectere ‘tie’, from which English also gets nexus and connect. The noun was borrowed from French annexe, and in the sense ‘extra building’ retains its -e.
=> connect, nexus
antipodes: antipodes: [16] Greek antípodes meant literally ‘people who have their feet opposite’ – that is, people who live on the other side of the world, and therefore have the soles of their feet ‘facing’ those of people on this side of the world. It was formed from the prefix anti- ‘against, opposite’ and poús ‘foot’ (related to English foot and pedal). English antipodes, borrowed via either French antipodes or late Latin antipodes, originally meant ‘people on the other side of the world’ too, but by the mid 16th century it had come to be used simply for the ‘opposite side of the globe’.
=> foot, pedal
antirrhinum: antirrhinum: [16] Antirrhinum means literally ‘similar to a nose’. The Greek compound antirrhīnon was formed from the prefix anti- ‘against, simulating’ and rhīn-, the stem of rhīs ‘nose’ (also found in English rhinoceros). The English word was borrowed from the latinized form, antirrhinum. The name comes, of course, from the snapdragon flower’s supposed resemblance to an animal’s nose or muzzle (another early name for the plant was calf ’s snout).
=> rhinoceros
any: any: [OE] Any is descended from a prehistoric Germanic compound meaning literally ‘one-y’ (a formation duplicated in unique, whose Latin source ūnicus was compounded of ūnus ‘one’ and the adjective suffix -icus). Germanic *ainigaz was formed from *ain- (source of English one) and the stem *-ig-, from which the English adjective suffix -y is ultimately derived. In Old English this had become ǣnig, which diversified in Middle English to any and eny; modern English any preserves the spelling of the former and the pronunciation of the latter.
=> one
apocalypse: apocalypse: [13] A ‘catastrophic event, such as the end of the world’ is a relatively recent, 20thcentury development in the meaning of apocalypse. Originally it was an alternative name for the book of the Bible known as the ‘Revelation of St. John the divine’, which describes a vision of the future granted to St John on the island of Patmos. And in fact, the underlying etymological meaning of apocalypse is literally ‘revelation’.

It comes, via Old French and ecclesiastical Latin, from Greek apokálupsis, a derivative of the verb apokalúptein ‘uncover, reveal’, which was formed from the prefix apo- ‘away, off’ and the verb kalúptein ‘cover’ (related to English conceal).
=> conceal
apocryphal: apocryphal: [16] Apocryphal is a ‘secondgeneration’ adjective; the original adjective form in English was apocrypha (‘The writing is apocrypha when the author thereof is unknown’, John de Trevisa 1387). This came, via ecclesiastical Latin, from Greek apókruphos ‘hidden’, a derivative of the compound verb apokrúptein ‘hide away’, which was formed from the prefix apo- ‘away, off’ and the verb krúptein ‘hide’ (source of English crypt and cryptic).

It was applied as a noun to writings in general that were of unknown authorship, and in the 16th century came to be used specifically as the collective term for the uncanonical books of the Old Testament. It was perhaps confusion between the adjectival and nominal roles of apocrypha that led to the formation of the new adjective apocryphal towards the end of the 16th century.
=> crypt, cryptic
apoplexy: apoplexy: [14] The Greek verb apopléssein meant ‘incapacitate by means of a stroke’. It was formed from the prefix apo- ‘away, off’ (here used as an intensive) and the verb pléssein ‘hit’ (source of English plectrum [17] and related to English complain, plangent, plankton, and plague). The derived noun, apoplēxíā, entered English via Latin and Old French.
=> complain, plague, plangent, plankton, plectrum
approach: approach: [14] Approach is etymologically connected with propinquity ‘nearness’; they both go back ultimately to Latin prope ‘near’. Propinquity [14] comes from a derived Latin adjective propinquus ‘neighbouring’, while approach is based on the comparative form propius ‘nearer’. From this was formed the late Latin verb appropiāre ‘go nearer to’, which came to English via Old French aprochier.

Latin prope, incidentally, may be connected in some way with the preposition prō (a relative of English for), and a hypothetical variant of it, *proqe, may be the source, via its superlative proximus, of English proximity and approximate.
=> approximate, propinquity, proximity
arcane: arcane: [16] Arcane comes from the Latin adjective arcānus ‘hidden, secret’. This was formed from the verb arcēre ‘close up’, which in turn came from arca ‘chest, box’ (source of English ark). The neuter form of the adjective, arcānum, was used to form a noun, usually used in the plural, arcāna ‘mysterious secrets’.
=> ark
around: around: [14] Around was formed in Middle English from the prefix a- ‘on’ and the noun round (perhaps influenced by the Old French phrase a la reonde ‘in the round, roundabout’). It was slow to usurp existing forms such as about – it does not occur in Shakespeare or the 1611 translation of the Bible – and it does not seem to have become strongly established before the end of the 17th century. The adverb and preposition round may be a shortening of around.
=> round
arouse: arouse: [16] Shakespeare is the first writer on record to use arouse, in 2 Henry VI, 1593: ‘Loud howling wolves arouse the jades that drag the tragic melancholy night’. It was formed, with the intensive prefix a-, from rouse, a word of unknown origin which was first used in English in the 15th century as a technical term in falconry, meaning ‘plump up the feathers’.
=> rouse
arson: arson: [17] Like ardour and ardent, arson comes from the Latin verb ardēre ‘burn’. Its past participle was arsus, from which was formed the noun arsiō ‘act of burning’. This passed via Old French into Anglo-Norman as arson, and in fact was in use in the Anglo-Norman legal language of England from the 13th century onwards (it occurs in the Statute of Westminster 1275). The jurist Sir Matthew Hale was the first to use the word in a vernacular text, in 1680. Other words in English ultimately related to it include arid and probably ash, area, and azalea.
=> ardour, area, ash, azalea
asbestos: asbestos: [14] Originally, the word we now know as asbestos was applied in the Middle Ages to a mythical stone which, once set alight, could never be put out; it came from the Greek compound ásbestos, literally ‘inextinguishable’, which was formed from the prefix a- ‘not’ and sbestós, a derivative of the verb sbennúnai ‘extinguish’. However, by the time it first came into English, its form was not quite what it is today.

To begin with, it was the Greek accusative form, ásbeston, that was borrowed, and in its passage from Latin through Old French it developed several variants, including asbeston and albeston, most of which turned up in English. Then, in the early 17th century, the word was reborrowed from the original Greek source, ásbestos, and applied to a noncombustible silicate mineral.
associate: associate: [14] Latin socius meant ‘companion’ (it is related to English sequel and sue), and has spawned a host of English words, including social, sociable, society, and socialism. In Latin, a verb was formed from it, using the prefix ad- ‘to’: associāre ‘unite’. Its past participle, associātus, was borrowed into English as an adjective, associate; its use as a verb followed in the 15th century, and as a noun in the 16th century.
=> sequel, social, society, sue
asthma: asthma: [14] The original idea contained in asthma is that of ‘breathing hard’. The Greek noun asthma was derived from the verb ázein ‘breathe hard’ (related to áein ‘blow’, from which English gets air). In its earliest form in English it was asma, reflecting its immediate source in medieval Latin, and though the Greek spelling was restored in the 16th century, the word’s pronunciation has for the most part stuck with asma.
=> air
astound: astound: [17] Astound, astonish, and stun all come ultimately from the same origin: a Vulgar Latin verb *extonāre, which literally meant something like ‘leave someone thunderstruck’ (it was formed from the Latin verb tonāre ‘thunder’). This became Old French estoner, which had three offshoots in English: it was borrowed into Middle English in the 13th century as astone or astun, and immediately lost its initial a, producing a form stun; then in the 15th century, in Scotland originally, it had the suffix -ish grafted on to it, producing astonish; and finally in the 17th century its past participle, astoned or, as it was also spelled, astound, formed the basis of a new verb.
=> astonish, stun
atlas: atlas: [16] In Greek mythology, Atlas was a Titan who as a punishment for rebelling against the gods was forced to carry the heavens on his shoulders. Hence when the term was first used in English it was applied to a ‘supporter’: ‘I dare commend him to all that know him, as the Atlas of Poetry’, Thomas Nashe on Robert Greene’s Menaphon 1589. In the 16th century it was common to include a picture of Atlas with his onerous burden as a frontispiece in books of maps, and from this arose the habit of referring to such books as atlases (the application is sometimes said to have arisen specifically from such a book produced in the late 16th century by the Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator (1512–94), published in England in 1636 under the title Atlas).

Atlas also gave his name to the Atlantic ocean. In ancient myth, the heavens were said to be supported on a high mountain in northwestern Africa, represented as, and now named after, the Titan Atlas. In its Greek adjectival form Atlantikós (later Latin Atlanticus) it was applied to the seas immediately to the west of Africa, and gradually to the rest of the ocean as it came within the boundaries of the known world.
=> atlantic
atom: atom: [16] Etymologically, atom means ‘not cut, indivisible’. Greek átomos ‘that which cannot be divided up any further’ was formed from the negative prefix a- ‘not’ and the base *tom- ‘cut’ (source also of English anatomy and tome), and was applied in the Middle Ages not just to the smallest imaginable particle of matter, but also to the smallest imaginable division of time; an hour contained 22,560 atoms.

Its use by classical writers on physics and philosophy, such as Democritus and Epicurus, was sustained by medieval philosophers, and the word was ready and waiting for 19th-century chemists when they came to describe and name the smallest unit of an element, composed of a nucleus surrounded by electrons.
=> anatomy, tome
attempt: attempt: [14] Attempting is etymologically related to tempting. The Latin verb attemptāre was formed with the prefix ad- from temptāre, which meant ‘try’ as well as ‘tempt’ (the semantic connection is preserved in modern English try, with the contrasting senses ‘attempt’ and ‘put to the test’). The Latin form passed into Old French as atenter (hence modern French attenter), but was later latinized back to attempter, the form in which English acquired it.
=> tempt